Terrorists strike yet again

26 killed in church attack in Texas' deadliest mass shooting

A man dressed in black tactical-style gear and armed with an assault rifle opened fire inside a church in a small South Texas community on Sunday, killing 26 people and wounding about 20 in what the governor called the deadliest mass shooting in the state's history. The dead ranged in age from 5 to 72 years old.

Devin P. Kelley received a bad-conduct discharge from the Air Force for allegedly assaulting his spouse and child, and was sentenced to 12 months' confinement after a 2012 court-martial.
 
Yeah I've been following this mess for a few hours. :cry: Ton of conflicting information flying around but what we do know is this:

-Gun free zone? Check.
-Shooter prohibited from legally buying/possessing firearms? Check.
-Media incorrectly calling his firearm an "assault rifle"? Check.

It also seems like a neighbor grabbed his own rifle and intervened, stopping the massacre, chasing down the bad guy, and possibly killing him.



Edit: found another article about how this finally ended:

?Hero? neighbor got his rifle, shot at Texas church gunman

A concerned neighbor who heard the Texas church massacre unfolding on Sunday went and grabbed his rifle and tried to stop it ? opening fire on the shooter and chasing him down in a stranger?s truck, a report says.

The man, who has not been publicly named, is being hailed online as a ?hero? after state officials described his actions during a press conference.

A resident told the local ABC affiliate KSAT that he teamed up with her boyfriend and the two gave chase for several minutes inside his truck before the alleged gunman, Devin Kelley, eventually crashed the car he was in.

Authorities said the armed neighbor may have saved countless lives by opening fire on Kelley and forcing him to flee the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs during his 11:30 a.m. massacre.

The young man reportedly had several guns inside his vehicle and was found dead inside. It?s unclear, though, if he died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound of if he was shot by the neighbor.

Summer Caddel told KSAT that her boyfriend, Johnnie Langendorff, watched the gunfight unfold between Kelley and the rifle-wielding resident. She said the neighbor then jumped into his truck and the pair gave chase.

Langendorff later described the dramatic events with local reporters.

?I pulled up to the intersection where the shooting happened and I saw two men exchanging gunfire, the other being a citizen of the community,? he said. ?The shooter of the church had taken off, fled in his vehicle, and the other gentleman came and he said, ?We need to pursue him,? that he just shot up the church. So that?s what I did. I just acted.?

Langendorff said he hadn?t seen the concerned neighbor before, but knew he was from the area.

?I didn?t know him at all,? he explained. ?He was just a member of the community, and whenever he came to my vehicle in distress with his weapon he explained very quickly what happened and he got in the truck and I knew it was just time [to go].?

Kelley reportedly had a head start, but that didn?t stop the pair from pursuing him.

?He got a little bit of a jump on us,? Langendorff said, noting how they called police as they were chasing him.

?So we were doing about 95mph, going around traffic and everything,? he added. ?Eventually he came to kind of a slowdown and after that, we got within just a few feet of him and he got off the road?He just lost control and thats whenever i put the vehicle in park?The other gentleman jumped out and had his rifle drawn on him and he didn?t move after that.?

According to Langendorff, it took cops about five to seven minutes to arrive on the scene ? and the neighbor kept his gun on Kelley the entire time.

?The police arrived and they pushed us back and they took care of the rest,? he said.

The cowboy hat-wearing citizen told KSAT he only had one thing on his mind while he was chasing Kelley with the armed neighbor: ?Try and get him.?

?It was strictly just acting on what the right thing to do was,? Langendorff said.
 
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I don't think the problem is guns

I think it's what you put into people's mind. It is cultural. The same culture that generates the heroic guys chasing the killer also generates the killer; let's hope it is possible to take away that which creates killers without taking away that which creates the heroes.
 
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first world country
 
Yeah I've been following this mess for a few hours. :cry: Ton of conflicting information flying around but what we do know is this:

-Gun free zone? Check.
-Shooter prohibited from legally buying/possessing firearms? Check.
-Media incorrectly calling his firearm an "assault rifle"? Check.

I don't think the problem is guns

I think it's what you put into people's mind. It is cultural. The same culture that generates the heroic guys chasing the killer also generates the killer; let's hope it is possible to take away that which creates killers without taking away that which creates the heroes.

A very tragic event indeed. The responses to it are also revealing. Even after we have established some of the facts, for the most part nobody is calling the killer an illegal or a terrorist. Back to the good old "he was just mentally ill."
 
The arguing over "he stopped the killer" vs the "um, actually, he had already stopped, so technically he didn't stop anything," is annoying.
 
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A very tragic event indeed. The responses to it are also revealing. Even after we have established some of the facts, for the most part nobody is calling the killer an illegal or a terrorist. Back to the good old "he was just mentally ill."

Well he was neither...
 
Jesus...the death toll is 7% of the town's population.
 
Well he was neither...

Here we go again...

In a previous discussion, I asked LeVeL if a person driving without a valid license would be called an illegal driver. He said yes. By that logic, the killer broke the law - he was not allowed to buy a firearm - therefore the definition would fit. He was an illegal. (That's not really my sticking point, but I use to show how ridiculous it is to call others, who commit much lesser crimes, "illegals").

And how is he not a terrorist? How is this different than what happened in New York just last week? Because he didn't say that one phrase? That's the litmus test we are using to determine who is a proper terrorist and who is just mentally ill? Can't the New York killer have been mentally ill too?

It's ironic how I'm often accused of being the language police here, but when it comes to terms like "terrorist" or "illegal" you seem to have very narrow and rigid definitions of those, which both rely on and reinforce old stereotypes of who has been called a "terrorist" or an "illegal."

I am willing to meet you half way here - this killer was a mentally ill terrorist. The two terms are not incompatible.
 
The arguing over "he stopped the killer" vs the "um, actually, he had already stopped, so technically he didn't stop anything," is annoying.

I wouldn?t be surprised if we learn the attack on the Church was just the first stop and he was probably gonna go on a spree.
 
And how is he not a terrorist? How is this different than what happened in New York just last week? Because he didn't say that one phrase? That's the litmus test we are using to determine who is a proper terrorist and who is just mentally ill? Can't the New York killer have been mentally ill too?

I'm pretty sure it all comes down to political motivation. Otherwise we might call gang members and various other killers "terrorists".
 
Here we go again...

In a previous discussion, I asked LeVeL if a person driving without a valid license would be called an illegal driver. He said yes. By that logic, the killer broke the law - he was not allowed to buy a firearm - therefore the definition would fit. He was an illegal. (That's not really my sticking point, but I use to show how ridiculous it is to call others, who commit much lesser crimes, "illegals").
No, it is ridiculous to keep harping on something that has an agreed upon definition. A stang is a Ford Mustang, not a wild horse. A vette is a Chevy Corvette not a type of ship, etc... English is a crowd sourced language, deal with it.


And how is he not a terrorist? How is this different than what happened in New York just last week? Because he didn't say that one phrase? That's the litmus test we are using to determine who is a proper terrorist and who is just mentally ill? Can't the New York killer have been mentally ill too?
So far we have seen no evidence of political motivation, which is a litmus test for terrorism.

It's ironic how I'm often accused of being the language police here, but when it comes to terms like "terrorist" or "illegal" you seem to have very narrow and rigid definitions of those, which both rely on and reinforce old stereotypes of who has been called a "terrorist" or an "illegal."
Actually the irony is that you fail to understand the language that you are trying to police. There is a definition for what a terrorist is, and a definition of what an illegal is (though latter is more of a short hand really).

I am willing to meet you half way here - this killer was a mentally ill terrorist. The two terms are not incompatible.
There is no meeting halfway, terrorism has a definition that has not currently been met.

Here is an example for you since you seem to be struggling; Timothy McVeigh was a terrorist, he had a political motivation behind his actions. Adam Lanza was a mentally ill mass murderer.
 
Here we go again...

In a previous discussion, I asked LeVeL if a person driving without a valid license would be called an illegal driver. He said yes. By that logic, the killer broke the law - he was not allowed to buy a firearm - therefore the definition would fit. He was an illegal. (That's not really my sticking point, but I use to show how ridiculous it is to call others, who commit much lesser crimes, "illegals").

And how is he not a terrorist? How is this different than what happened in New York just last week? Because he didn't say that one phrase? That's the litmus test we are using to determine who is a proper terrorist and who is just mentally ill? Can't the New York killer have been mentally ill too?

It's ironic how I'm often accused of being the language police here, but when it comes to terms like "terrorist" or "illegal" you seem to have very narrow and rigid definitions of those, which both rely on and reinforce old stereotypes of who has been called a "terrorist" or an "illegal."

I am willing to meet you half way here - this killer was a mentally ill terrorist. The two terms are not incompatible.
SSSSTTTTTOOOOOOOOPPPPPPPPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I, for one, am seriously tired of your language policing.
 
:rolleyes:
 
No, it is ridiculous to keep harping on something that has an agreed upon definition. A stang is a Ford Mustang, not a wild horse. A vette is a Chevy Corvette not a type of ship, etc... English is a crowd sourced language, deal with it.

So far we have seen no evidence of political motivation, which is a litmus test for terrorism.

Actually the irony is that you fail to understand the language that you are trying to police. There is a definition for what a terrorist is, and a definition of what an illegal is (though latter is more of a short hand really).

There is no meeting halfway, terrorism has a definition that has not currently been met.

Here is an example for you since you seem to be struggling; Timothy McVeigh was a terrorist, he had a political motivation behind his actions. Adam Lanza was a mentally ill mass murderer.

And as I pointed out before, words like "nigger" were also crowd-sourced agreed upon definitions, until we realized how awfully offensive they were.

The very first line in the wikipedia entry on terrorism says that there is no universal agreement on the definition of terrorism. There is a list of qualifiers, and a list of dis-qualifiers. Notably, mental illness does not disqualify something of being a terrorist act (which doesn't excuse the act, but shows a double standard that we uphold).

Let's look at the very basic definition:
It is the use of violence or threat of violence in the pursuit of political aims, religious, or ideological change.

The killer went to shoot people at a church, targeting people of religion. His actions were also premeditated. He probably is mentally ill, but he also committed a terrorist act.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

SSSSTTTTTOOOOOOOOPPPPPPPPPP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I, for one, am seriously tired of your language policing.

So you are allowed to language police us on gun terminology and who counts as a real terrorist, but not the other way around? Got it.
 
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So you are allowed to language police us on gun terminology and who counts as a real terrorist, but not the other way around? Got it.
Yeah, because calling a regular gun an "assault weapon" (made up term) is done ONLY to instill fear in the ignorant. Calling a person who is in the country illegally an "illegal" is actually accurate. Whether you call the Texas shooter a terrorist or not, quite frankly I don't care - one way or another he's a POS.
 

Well, at least now we have moved on from discussing the act itself to a transparent "I'm right, you're wrong" using the act as a background. It's progress...of a sort.
 
And as I pointed out before, words like "nigger" were also crowd-sourced agreed upon definitions, until we realized how awfully offensive they were.
The N-word, has no other purpose than to disparage a group of people based on nothing but their skin color. "Illegal" is simply short hand for "illegal alien" which is nothing but a description of one's immigration status. If you want to put some sort of racial or disparaging undertones it's on you.

The very first line in the wikipedia entry on terrorism says that there is no universal agreement on the definition of terrorism. There is a list of qualifiers, and a list of dis-qualifiers. Notably, mental illness does not disqualify something of being a terrorist act (which doesn't excuse the act, but shows a double standard that we uphold).
As a scholar I would expect a better source than wikipedia.
The killer went to shoot people at a church, targeting people of religion. His actions were also premeditated. He probably is mentally ill, but he also committed a terrorist act.
Where is the evidence that he targeted people of religion for religious reasons rather than practical reasons?

The two are not mutually exclusive.
I would say that two are inexorably linked, IMO no mentally stable person would go on a killing spree in the first place but what does that have to do with anything?

I don't really understand what you are trying to achieve in the first place, far as I know there has been no evidence of any kind of ideological* underpinnings of this guy's actions. If/when some are found we can call him a terrorist, till then his just a mass murderer.

*I use that term as a catch all her for political, religious, etc...
 
Interesting: for the NY attack, I had to actively look for a photo of the killer. In this case, his photo is everywhere.
 
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